“Why do people invest in advertising if they already know and use most of your products?”

Speaking on day five at the International Festival of Creativity 2013, Robert Kyncl, vice president, Google, and head of content, YouTube, brought up a mistake he had made in the past – of comparing YouTube TV.

Benefits of YouTube

Kyncl spoke about the two-way communication experience; the sharing and creativity aspects of YouTube.

“I compared YouTube to television,” said Kyncl. “But YouTube has been built for Gen C (creation, curation, connection and community). YouTube is everywhere, but the television is up there only on a wall. People viewing videos on YouTube are fans. Not only do they watch, they share,” he added.

Kyncl, who has worked with two companies (Netflix and YouTube) in the content department, went on to explain the benefits for brands that opt to use YouTube.  He said, “YouTube provides a brand with the most creative medium to put out its stories. On YouTube, you can tell stories in ways that are not possible on other mediums and it allows fans to share it. And once you get fans’ attention, you build your community instead of stagnating content.”

He showed a few clips of the relatively recent media phenomenon Harlem Shake, and underlined how brands had creatively used the idea to create successful YouTube content.

Kyncl ended his talk by showing clips of some successful YouTube campaigns.

Digital can create a spark

Fernando Machado, global brand development vice president, Dove Skin, was up next. He started by putting forward a question an officer at John F Kennedy airport had asked him: “Why do people invest in advertising if people already know and use most of your products?”

He answered that question with the help of a case study – Dove’s ‘Make women feel beautiful’ campaign.

“Four per cent of women considered themselves to be beautiful. That means 96 per cent of the women were unhappy with themselves. That’s when Steve Miles said, ‘Let’s make women beautiful. We knew YouTube would be the right choice and on 14 April we put a video on YouTube. Within 24 hours the campaign had generated all the buzz possible. Through one upload, we had created a massive conversation. On 19 April, we translated videos across different languages and then got into paid exposure. The result, we gained 75 million views on YouTube,” he explained.

Currently, the Dove Ad is the most viewed ad on YouTube with more than 155 million views.

He ended his talk saying: “This shows digital can create a spark.”

Videos speak a million words

Next up in the session was Tom Cooke, from Top Shop.

He spoke about how his consumers were digital savvy and how the company had to hit YouTube.

“Women want to be the show. We couldn’t show that through a 30-second film, so we had to create a digital campaign. If people say a picture speaks thousand words, videos speak a million.”
Cooke showed an adapt of the Harlem Shake in his session, which featured models from a fashion show and labeled it the most ‘glamourous Harlem Shake.”

Gen C doesn’t watch TV

Carolyn Probst Iyer, digital consumer engagement, Chevrolet, brought a case study on the launch of the Chevrolet Sonic.

“Chevrolet had an image of producing only utility vehicles and trucks in America. We had to launch a hatchback, the Sonic,” said Probst Iyer.

She added, “Our challenge was, that we had to target the youth. They don’t spend time watching television. They’re on YouTube, social media and always connected. Our plan to hit social media with multiple campaigns on the Sonic was not leaving our internal team completely convinced. Somehow we convinced them and launched a series of films, showing the Sonic, bungee jumping, skydiving etc. The timing was around Red Bull’s stratosphere initiative, and so we also tied up with the brand.”

This resulted in youngsters coming in abundance for test drives of the Sonic and the brand claims to have achieved its target - thanks to YouTube.